June 06, 2009

Israelis Talk Green Tech

The Israel Conference had a 'green tech' discussion in LA this past week. Isaac Applebaum who is a partner at at clean-tech VC fund Westly Group was on the panel with Ron Hadar of Tigo Energy, who raised a $10 million round. Think efficiencies in solar installation.

Also on the panel was Assaf Barnea, the CEO of Kinrut Ventures which is an incubator for projects of all aspects of water technologies, and David Nahai, CEO & GM of LA Department of water and power. Isabel Maxwell moderated.

Isaac thinks where technology was roughly ten years ago is where clean tech is now. They discussed alternatives, such as geothermal, solar, aggressive water recycling, which is now at 1%. Compare to coal at 46%, gas at 30%, and hydro, renewable and nuclear which are all at 8%.

On direct comparisons, David reminds us that we need to take into account future "taxes" on carbon fuels and the cost of 'not doing business.'

Takeaways for the audience:

Ron: "do better for the community and make good personal choices."

David: "crisis and opportunity are two sides of one coin."

Assaf: "don't try to duplicate whatever you got used to in the high-tech industries. This is a totally different market and with different models."

Isaac: "find exciting companies run by passionate people and make money."